Search

Assignment of parentage with molecular markers is most difficult when the true parents have close relatives in the adult population. Here, we present an efficient solution to that problem by extending simple exclusion approaches to parentage analysis with single nucleotide polymorphic markers (SNPs). We augmented the previously published homozygote opposite test (hot), which counts mismatches due to the offspring and candidate parent having different homozygous genotypes, with an additional test. In this case, parents homozygous for the same SNP are incompatible with heterozygous offspring (i.e., "Homozygous Identical Parents, Heterozygous Offspring are Precluded": hiphop). We tested this approach in a cooperatively breeding bird, the superb fairy‐wren, Malurus cyaneus, where rates of extra‐pair paternity are exceptionally high, and where paternity assignment is challenging because breeding males typically have first‐order adult relatives in their neighbourhood. Combining the tests and conditioning on the maternal genotype with a set of 1376 autosomal SNPs always allowed us to distinguish a single most likely sire from his relatives, and also to identify cases where the true sire must have been unsampled. In contrast, if just the hot test was used, we failed to identify a single most‐likely sire in 2.5% of cases. Resampling enabled us to create guidelines for the number of SNPs required when first‐order relatives coexist in the mating pool. Our method, implemented in the R package hiphop, therefore provides unambiguous parentage assignments even in systems with complex social organisation. We also identified a suite of Z‐ and W‐linked SNPs that always identified sex correctly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The superb fairy‐wren, Malurus cyaneus, is one of the most iconic Australian passerine species. This species belongs to an endemic Australasian clade, Meliphagides, which diversified early in the evolution of the oscine passerines. Today, the oscine passerines comprise almost half of all avian species diversity. Despite the rapid increase of available bird genome assemblies, this part of the avian tree has not yet been represented by a high‐quality reference. To rectify that, we present the first high‐quality genome assembly of a Meliphagides representative: the superb fairy‐wren. We combined Illumina shotgun and mate‐pair sequences, PacBio long‐reads, and a genetic linkage map from an intensively sampled pedigree of a wild population to generate this genome assembly. Of the final assembled 1.07‐Gb genome, 975 Mb (90.4%) was anchored onto 25 pseudochromosomes resulting in a final superscaffold N50 of 68.11 Mb. This high‐quality bird genome assembly is one of only a handful which is also accompanied by a genetic map and recombination landscape. In comparison to other pedigree‐based bird genetic maps, we find that the fairy‐wren genetic map more closely resembles those of Taeniopygia guttata and Parus major maps, unlike the Ficedula albicollis map which more closely resembles that of Gallus gallus. Lastly, we also provide a predictive gene and repeat annotation of the genome assembly. This new high‐quality, annotated genome assembly will be an invaluable resource not only regarding the superb fairy‐wren species and relatives but also broadly across the avian tree by providing a novel reference point for comparative genomic analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent advances in high-throughput sequencing library preparation and subgenomic enrichment methods have opened new avenues for population genetics and phylogenetics of nonmodel organisms. To multiplex large numbers of indexed samples while sequencing predominantly orthologous, targeted regions of the genome, we propose modifications to an existing, in-solution capture that utilizes PCR products as target probes to enrich library pools for the genomic subset of interest. The sequence capture using PCR-generated probes ( SCPP) protocol requires no specialized equipment, is highly flexible and significantly reduces experimental costs for projects where a modest scale of genetic data is optimal (25-100 genomic loci). Our alterations enable application of this method across a wider phylogenetic range of taxa and result in higher capture efficiencies and coverage at each locus. Efficient and consistent capture over multiple SCPP experiments and at various phylogenetic distances is demonstrated, extending the utility of this method to both phylogeographic and phylogenomic studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]